Cold Souls Review

Posted by Erik Luers on 08.19.2009

An excellent use of the bartering system........

Paul Giamatti ... Paul
Dina Korzun ... Nina
Emily Watson ... Claire
David Strathairn ... Dr. Flintstein
Katheryn Winnick ... Sveta
Lauren Ambrose ... Stephanie











In Sophie Barthes’ new film, Cold Souls, Paul Giamatti plays a character by the name of Paul Giamatti. Typecasting, I know. He’s a New York film and theater star obsessed with trying to conquer a leading role in a new production of Uncle Vanya. He is slowly giving up on life (I hear Chekov can do that to you), and he feels rather shallow and empty. He realizes that he is stressed, but what to do? A friend recommends he look at an article in a recent issue of The New Yorker (the periodical that employed the great Pauline Kael from 1968-1991) that describes a unique process known as soul storage. That’s right, for a hefty sum you can store your soul in a warehouse and go through life carefree and soulless. It takes a lot of weight off your back and a whole lot of cash out of your bank account.

Can someone really survive without a soul? What are souls, anyway? Memories? Belief systems? Thought processes? Maybe the idea of a soul is all metaphorical, a sheep in wolf’s clothing. But would you volunteer to live without one? It would be like work without the payday, sex without the orgasm. These are pretty heavy, rhetorical questions that Cold Souls asks us to consider, but its approach to doing so is so cheerful and surprisingly optimistic that the film becomes fun and morally complex, but enjoyable.

So yes, Paul Giamatti does wind up getting his soul extracted — probably around the time he signed on to do M. Night Shyamalan’s The Lady in the Water — and with that comes a whole new list of troubles and worries. His wife, played by Emily Watson (an actress who seems to always be playing the love interest to brilliant character actors like Philip Seymour Hoffman and Mr. Giamatti) notices that he smells different and that his skin is getting rather flakey, almost scaley. That’s right, not only does soul extraction provide you with feelings of melancholy, but also with a severe case of eczema! Paul soon realizes that, while he does not want his soul, he cannot live without any soul.

That’s an interesting character trait. As the story began, I wondered if the characters could fully live without a soul. While at first glance it would appear that they could, each of our characters seems to quickly run off to get a new one to satisfy their “soul high” or “soul fix”. They become dependent on them, and one could rightly classify them as unabashful addicts. My two cents: when your nose starts dripping blood in the shower, you may have had your fair share.

That’s right, Cold Souls is an existential drug movie, and what would a good drug movie be without drug trafficking? For that, the film looks towards the Russians, but I do not want to delve too deeply into that story arch. We meet a blond soul junkie early on that works for a similar soul extraction agency in Russia. I enjoyed this idea; Barthes broadens the scope of the “soul trade” by expanding it beyond American soil. Everyone wants in on this lucrative business, that is, all except Robert Redford and Al Pacino. Don’t worry, you’ll see. Barthes takes us to Russia throughout the film and the snow covered lands are quite beautiful, stunning, and rapturous. This description also applies to actress Katheryn Winnick, who plays Sveta, the wife to a very important higher up. She is a sight to behold.

Cold Souls is a very New York film, and I do not define it as such strictly based on its primary setting. The theater plays a heavy role throughout the film, and many New York theater actors are cast in small roles. Among these names are Lauren Ambrose and Michael Stuhlbarg (previously seen by me in last summer’s Shakespeare in Central Park as Ophelia and Hamlet, respectively), both as good as they can be given their limited screentime. Mr. Giamatti, the actor as well as the character in this movie, also does a lot of theater work when he’s not exploring the grounds of Hollywood. I found it somewhat ironic that in a Paul Giamatti film, there is so much talk of Al Pacino, as I was privileged to see the two square off seven years ago on stage in The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui by Bertolt Brecht at Pace University.

Giamatti is one of America’s best living actors, as he always seems to be thinking about something. He is a master of the internal thought. He makes fidgeting a master class in acting; look at the way he observes the items on Dr. Flintstein’s desk whenever the two sit down to chat. His character is always so frantic that he appears to have had six energy drinks too many, and his eyes only help to express his hyperactivity. I remember an interview Giamatti gave on Late Night with Conan o’ Brien a few years back where he described being unable to watch himself on film. He explained that he thought he had two huge golf balls for eyes, and it horrified him. Little did he know that the use of his eyes would help to deepen each performance he gave, especially those in Sideways and Cold Souls.

Aside from the performers, Sophie Barthes’ expertly structured screenplay stands out as a modest take on what it means to be alive. I realize that sounds a little heavy, and while the idea of it is, Barthes’ touch is a little lighter than most. Cold Souls is not a complex hypothetical downer but a morose look at our everyday lives. It’s a Woody Allen concept without that particular brand of humor; that’s okay, there’s room for hundreds of comedic philosophers in New York. Everyone needs something to keep them moving forward in life, and Barthes’ script asks us individually what ours is. One girl in the film wants to be a serious actress but doesn’t want to work at becoming one. Can artistic drive be obtained or must it be stolen from another soul? You think, therefore you are, but what are you? I am reminded of that classic line in the late John Hughes’ Ferris Bueller’s Day Off in which the title character states, “life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it”. The characters in Cold Souls aren’t interested in their own lives. They’re watching through the eyes of another.

What better place to store these souls than on Roosevelt Island, a place I finally was able to visit last week for the first time. I didn't see Dr. Flintstein or Paul Giamatti (see what happens when you opt for the subway instead of the tram), but it was a friendly environment all the same. Quiet, peaceful, and with a great view of Manhattan, there's an aura about Roosevelt Island that really emphasizes a sense of community, perhaps because it is secluded from the five city boroughs. What a perfect place to set a mysterious clinic like this crazy soul lab. It's a small office in a small area of the city, which is quite fitting for this line of work. The tramway that takes you back and forth from the island also serves as an area in which to meditate and think about the life altering decision you are about to make. It's your mode of transportation, suspended by a cable high in the sky, that can carry you to heaven.

Cold Souls is a late summer release that I found to be very refreshing and enjoyable. Some may define the premise as Charlie Kaufman-esque, but Barthes' approach is lighter in tone, and a little less sterile, and that works well for this piece. For a film about the removal and trading of one's soul, it is grounded firmly in reality, or at least as much a film like this could be. Let's be honest, the concept of Cold Soul is absurd, but its creators are not. The film may be a little confusing at times (the question of who's soul is swapped with who's may come up more than once) but try and go with it. We are asked questions here like, if a soul cannot be seen, does it even exist? And if it can be seen, does it matter what it looks like? In Paul Giamatti's case, possessing a soul the size of a chickpea, let's hope that women truly believe, "it's not about the size of the soul, but what you do with it." Cold Souls seems inspired by Samuel Beckett and Edward Albee, and Sophie Barthes may one day be as good as both. Maybe.

The 411: Go see Cold Souls. It features an excellent leading performance by Paul Giamatti in a role that only he could play (har de har har), and a smart, profound screenplay by Sophie Barthes that will hopefully receive some Academy Award consideration come winter. It's a small movie with nuance and big ideas, and its plot is absurd, but grounded. It's hard to find films nowadays that are both deep and funny, but Cold Souls manages to tackle both, taking a philosophical look at what makes human beings tick. Oh, and what makes them so darn crazy.

Final Score:  8.0   [ Very Good ]